Once Again
by ncfan
Summary: She had thought she'd left this behind her.


I own nothing.

* * *

She had thought she'd left this behind her.

Galadriel had thought, had hoped, to never see anything like this again.

She had prayed to never be asked to lift a sword against her kin again.

But then, she reflected bitterly, she had prayed for many things over the years, in desperate times, and none of these prayers ever went fulfilled. The world was ever being torn apart for the sake of three worthless baubles. Now was no different.

They had come upon Doriath suddenly. With Melian gone, the power of the Girdle was broken. Many of the Edhil living in the Forest of Region had already been killed, had fled Doriath or retreated to the relative safety of Menegroth during the chaos surrounding Thingol's death and the aftermath. The marchwardens were nearly all dead. They had had no warning beyond the letters Fëanor's son sent Dior, demanding the return of the Silmaril to their custody.

They hadn't been expecting this.

"We have to get to Dior," Celeborn muttered in her ear. Galadriel nodded to show she had heard, not daring to speak aloud. The corridor had fallen into eerie silence; further away, Galadriel could hear the sounds of screaming, muffled by stone. They would stumble upon pockets of fighting eventually, but for now, they were alone, the two of them, and they could not afford to draw attention to themselves.

Galadriel and her husband had, since being separated from their group, been encountering only the bodies of the dead, and enemy soldiers in ones and twos. They, Galadriel and Celeborn cut down without hesitation, without giving any heed to their pleading. Celeborn had already found Nimloth's body, found the bodies of his mother, his brother, his sister-in-law, bloody and broken and cold. There was no mercy left in him. Galadriel could see the flames dancing behind his eyes like a banked fire, growing hotter all the while.

And once again, Galadriel found herself fighting and killing her father's kin to protect her mother's. They had found no mercy from her in Alqualondë, and would find none from her now in Menegroth. Artanis was merciless towards the slaughterers of her mother's kin, and Galadriel was no less so. Eventually, the Noldor began to flee from her, just as they had done in Alqualondë. Some of these soldiers may have even been the same ones who fled from her at the blood-stained quays.

But her heart was heavy, bleak and heavy as stone.

Artanis had jumped into the battle without thinking, all those centuries ago. She had never killed another Elda, never had their blood on her hands, and the term 'Kinslayer' meant nothing to her. She had seen her mother's people being slaughtered, and her blood roared in her ears, deafening reason and sanity and mercy. She hadn't once felt the full weight of what she had done until afterwards, until she saw the blood on her sword, on her skirt and sleeves, on her hands, and she had tried to wipe it away, but it wouldn't go. She had looked around at the corpses, and her breath caught in her throat as the stink of blood and viscera and urine rose in a noxious miasma.

Galadriel was different. She understood the weight of death and lives taken and lost, and she had not jumped into this battle gladly, nor even with fire in her heart. She'd not even intended to fight at all, until Celeborn had pressed a sword into her hands and they had come across enemy soldiers intent on slaying them. Then, there was little choice. Galadriel had no love for killing, but even less for dying. Her brothers were dead, but she had no intention of joining them. The Noldorin soldiers were intent on slaughter, many of them drunk on blood, and she was defending her mother's kin. Galadriel killed her foes, and felt empty.

Beside her, Celeborn was much the same as she had been in Alqualondë; Galadriel could even guess that his blood was roaring in his ears as hers had done. Galadriel looked at Celeborn and could see herself as she must have been at Alqualondë. He had no idea what it was to have the blood of Edhil on his hands. When this battle was over, if he still lived, would he feel that weight then? Galadriel was torn between wishing yes and no. She did not wish for Celeborn to feel the same guilt and uncertainty that she felt, but neither did she want him to walk away from this with no sense of the weight of blood.

If either of them walked away from this, that is. That was still up in the air. The only living Doriathrin Edhil Galadriel and Celeborn came across were Edhil fleeing the slaughter. To see their panicked faces, _that _was enough to stoke the flames of anger in her, if only slightly. Her cousins were doing this. She'd not thought them capable of this without their father egging them on, but it seemed that she was wrong.

_But is their father _not _still driving them, even after death? The Oath is Fëanáro's Oath. I heard the words. It will drive them to the ends of the earth. Is their father _not _still driving them to recover his Silmarils? Fëanáro's power extends beyond the grave._

Galadriel nearly tripped over the body of a slain child. She knew her cousins' Oath could not be foresworn. She wished they had never sworn it instead.

They were making slow progress, but they were still steadily approaching the throne room, where Galadriel knew that they would find Dior. She could not explain this knowledge, but she knew Dior well enough to know that she would not run from a fight. He was impulsive, over-confident in his abilities. The young King would face the Sons of Fëanor without fear, and that lack of fear could very well become his downfall.

The two of them turned a corner down a corridor that should have taken them directly to the throne room, and come to an abrupt halt. Blocking the way was a wall of Noldorin soldiers, their swords gleaming deadly-bright in the torch light.

"Artanis." A nér roughly pushed his way to the front of the ranks, pushing aside his dark green cloak and eyeing the sword in her hands the way others might eye a challenge to a game of cards. His gaze flickered briefly to Celeborn, but returned almost immediately to Galadriel. "Cousin," Caranthir said, so evenly that she could hardly believe it was him.

But it was him. That flushed face and the tense set of his shoulders told the tale that his even voice did not. "I don't have your father's Silmaril, Carnistir," she snapped. "Neither of us do. Get out of our way, or I will remove you from our path."

Caranthir's mouth twisted in a bitter, grotesque semblance of a smile. "I know that, Artanis. Do you not think that I would be able to tell if you did?"

Yes, she supposed that he probably would be able to tell. When Dior had worn the Silmaril, set as it was in her brother's necklace, his skin was suffused with light. He looked more like a Maiarin spirit of light than he did an Edhel. The effect was both dazzling to the eye and unnerving. It might have been so unnerving because Fëanor and Finwë had looked the same when they wore the Silmarils in Aman. If either Galadriel or Celeborn had the Silmaril on their person, the effect would be immediately obvious to Caranthir.

Celeborn took a step forward, holding his sword aloft menacingly. "Move aside," he growled, voice low. Grief and rage had robbed him of any eloquence. Galadriel couldn't fathom why he did not move to slay the Noldor before them now, when he had never hesitated to do so before now on this terrible night. Perhaps it was because her cousin stood before them at the head of the soldiers. Galadriel didn't know whether to feel gratified or alarmed.

Caranthir shot an irritated look at him; for the first time, Galadriel noticed the spots of blood on his cloak. "You're her husband, then? Celeborn? I should think you'd have more sense, if Artanis was willing to marry you."

That probably hadn't been intended as a taunt, but the trouble with Caranthir was that, with the way he often spoke, half of what he said was interpreted as a taunt whether he wanted it to be or not. Grief and rage had already robbed Celeborn of eloquence. Now, it robbed him of caution, too, as he advanced on the Noldor, with Galadriel trying and failing to stop him.

At the sight of his cousin-by-marriage doing his very best to engage in a suicidal charge, Caranthir's irritated expression turned to exasperation. "Your King is dead," he announced. Celeborn drew in a sharp breath, and even as she took the opportunity to wrap her hands around his arm to restrain him, Galadriel swallowed hard on the knot in her throat. _Of course. Impulsive, reckless fool. Young fool. _"You do not have to join him," Caranthir went on.

Galadriel stared sharply at him. "What do you _mean_, exactly?"

Her cousin's brow furrowed. "What I mean," Caranthir said slowly, the irritation slowly bleeding out of his voice, "is that I am giving you a choice. You and your husband can stay here, and fight. You will die if you do so."

"You speak with such certainty," Galadriel retorted bitterly.

Caranthir's mouth twisted momentarily, but other than that he did not react to her interruption; an extraordinary instance of restraint, for him. "But I am giving you the chance to leave. You, and your husband, and anyone under your protection may leave." He looked at her, and irritation gave way to a strange weariness. "These three—" he nodded to the soldiers to his immediate left "—will see you out and ensure your safety."

Celeborn opened his mouth, and Galadriel knew that if he was allowed to speak, he would refuse the offer, probably so belligerently that Caranthir would retract it altogether. "We accept," she said quickly, nodding stiffly. "Thank you, Carnistir."

"Galadriel…" Celeborn stared at her incredulously, not relaxing his grip on his sword for even a moment.

She shook her head, cast her gaze downwards. "If the King is dead, we should see to the living," she murmured, the bitter taste of defeat gathering on her tongue.

He stared at her for a moment more, before slowly nodding. Galadriel watched his face crease and crumple, as he gave up his dead kin at last, in favor of the living. At the same time, Celeborn set his jaw grimly, and she knew that this wasn't over. Good. It wasn't over for her either.

Caranthir nodded to the three he had pointed out, and they, Galadriel and Celeborn started down the corridor away from the throne room. As they left, Caranthir called after her, "I hope that this is not our last meeting, cousin." It might have been the way his voice echoed on the walls, but Galadriel thought he sounded rather gloomy. And somehow, she didn't think that she was going to see her cousin again.

Galadriel did not stop to contemplate her cousin's moment of mercy. As they left, they gathered nineteen Edhil who found them and were relieved to be given safe passage away from the pandemonium engulfing the caves. Once they had left the caves and were out in the freezing woods, shivering in the snow, Caranthir's three soldiers turned away from them, and disappeared back inside the caves of Menegroth.

Galadriel turned, and faced the nineteen standing before her with sudden trepidation.

After Alqualondë, she had looked at her father's kin and seen hostility in the eyes of many. For a long moment, a long, terrible moment, she had thought that they would brand her betrayer and slay her, for she, Noldorin princess, had slain her father's kin. She had looked at them, and felt sure that they would turn their backs on her. Even when they didn't, even when she told herself that she should not have felt guilt for defending her mother's kin, the weight of the blood on her hands was still making it difficult to walk, to breathe, to keep her eyes open and not see blood behind her eyelids, not see the accusatory stares of her father's kin.

It was not the same here. The nineteen who had been saved by Caranthir's mercy looked at with their rescuers with nothing but relief and gratitude on their faces. Galadriel felt all the energy flood out of her, and she sagged against Celeborn's shoulder, content to let him plan their next course of action. She closed her eyes, and tried not to hear the screams in the caves behind her, nor smell the blood clinging to her skin. Tried not to confuse this place with Alqualondë, and failed.

* * *

Artanis—Galadriel  
Fëanáro—Fëanor  
Carnistir—Caranthir

Edhil—Elves (singular: Edhel) (Sindarin)  
Elda—an Elf from one of the Three Kindreds who went to Aman (the Sindar are included as well) (plural: Eldar)  
Nér—man (plural: neri)


End file.
